LUCENA
(Philippines) - Adventurous fresh graduates can seek their
fortunes in insurgency-plagued Mindanao, President Gloria
Arroyo said.
'If we want to stop the war in Mindanao, we need more development,
and there will be more job opportunities in Mindanao for the
more adventurous of our graduates this year,' she told members
of the graduating class of the Enverga University during the
school's 55th commencement exercises.

She
admitted that the unemployment rate, at 10.3 per cent, was
'still high', especially in Metro Manila.
'That is a lot. But we hope that in the next one to three
years, we could bring this down,' she said.
She added that the government still needed to create more
jobs for 2.4 million Filipinos until 2004.
It was not the policy of the government to export labour,
but if there is demand, those who would want to work abroad
will have to be screened, she said.
She also cited the job prospects offered by information and
communication technology (ICT).

'We
have the competitive edge on ICT. The Filipino workers rank
No 1 in the world in the field of ICT today.'
She added that job opportunities were present in the tourism
industry as well. --Philippine Daily Inquirer/Asia News Network